​Rigsby and I made an agreement. If I can catch him, I get to bathe him and give him a haircut. Fair enough.

​If you recall, I am trying to save sixty dollars here. Chasing a dog seems worth it. I do that for free all the time. If it’s too cold to take him on a walk, I chase him until one of us tires out. Before agreeing to this haircut deal with him, I should have remembered that it is always me who tires out first. Always.​Once he is caught and bathed, I need a break. By the time I’m back his hair is dry, but I am able to offer more patience and less profanity to the endeavor.

I don’t get the buzzers out. The noise makes him cower and fight and makes me feel like a huge bully. Those attempts have usually ended with me abandoning the idea, and then both of us are upset and irritated for hours. And not one hair shorter.

I prepare all of the necessary supplies tweaked for his personal preferences. I line treats up on the counter within easy human reach but out of his sight. Once he sees them-boom-he obsesses. Then the whining starts. Jumping. Panic sets in. He must have the treats. It becomes the most important thing in the world. Hard to divert that kind of intensity for a haircut.

I find and set out the right comb. (We have five wrong combs.) And the professional scissors that cut easily and don’t tug with each snip. (We have three wrong scissors. Pet stores—I am your friend.)

Experience dictates the location of this haircut. I lock us in the bathroom. This will best contain the tornado of hair that happens even when I try to be careful. I try to place it in a bag or even flush it, but no matter what it always ends up blanketing the floor and me. Being in a small room also better prevents escape, and the inevitable tag game we play when he is anxious about something—see above: dog chase.

​I usually do this in painting clothes because what I wear becomes permanently fur lined. Even laundering does not remove all the clingy black hairs that burrow and weave into the fabric like termites.

I have two secret weapons: treats and time. The treats today are primo -- lunch meat. Time is on my side -- two hours until I need to walk over and get the kids.

I open the window for air, do some practice air snip snips, and then I get down to business. FYI: Don’t try this at home.

Rigs is extremely patient and cooperative at the start, for a whole four minutes. Then he looks around. He knows the drill. He gets treats. So I break a small piece of ham off and keep pruning his face hair (mustache/eyebrows/chops.) This is where I found two full ticks this week, which prompted the haircut.

In ten seconds, he is ready for another treat. My hands are both busy with the snipping. I use one hand to comb through his curls, and the other to snip what hairs extend over my knuckles. This way I am sure to get a uniform length and it’s impossible to accidentally snip his skin. FYI: If you pull the hair up and then snip with no protective barrier, you can really do some harm. Ask YouTube.

So the treat. Anywhere I put it that I can reach, so can he. I already have to corner him between the toilet and the cabinet to get his more guarded areas. I need to be able to pop that treat into his mouth and then quickly trim the momentarily exposed areas. Whoa, whoa, I mean his armpits and neck, people. ​Then I remember the difference in our IQs. And I put the ham on my head. Discreetly. Like I’m scratching my scalp. ​

​Rigsby is perplexed. He can smell it. But where is it? He checks the tub, propping his paws on the edge. I trim his tummy. He checks my knee pit. I trim behind his ears. He checks the crack of the door. I trim under his collar.

I give him the ham. Then I hide the next treat in a washcloth. He rummages. While he is busy, I trim his booty.

It’s been two hours. Believe it. My hand starts cramping. I finish his front half, excluding the feet which I save for last.

He lies down. I start the feet. He does not like the feet. I trim in between the pads of his paws and between his toenails, and up his little shank legs that seem part rabbit, part frog. He is very unhappy now. I have two feet to go and he is sitting on them. I know he is doing it on purpose.

Through the open window I hear the school bell. EEKS! I have to go get the kids. I’m in my holey, paint splattered jogging pants--covered in a second skin of dog hair. It’s a horrific sight. Once I hear that bell, I have three minutes to walk over.

​Dog not done. Bathroom floor looks like a shag rug. I look like the shag rug’s twin.

​I change clothes, feeling incredibly twitchy and itchy and sneezy. I shut the bathroom door on the mess. There is no way I can leave him in there. He’d freak. He’d never enter again.

​Plus, he is a very busy and important dog. I let him loose and he gets right to work. His normal job is racing to every window and barking at each school bus from every angle. Someone has to do it. Every day. Frantically.

For today’s work, he’s sporting a new uniform. With his back feet not trimmed and the rest of his body all sleek and short, he looks like he’s wearing dog bell bottoms.​When I return with the kids, the only thing they find funnier than how I look is how he looks.

​I lure him into the bathroom again and finish his feet. He is not happy. He tries to nose the scissors out of the way at every snip. Finally, I call the haircut over and he begs to go outside. It’s been hours, I can’t make him wait. But I know what he’ll do.

​He rolls, shakes, shimmies, and wiggles in the wettest muck pile he can find.

Meanwhile, I begin clean-up. ​I vacuum and then run a wet cloth over the tiles, toilet, and baseboards. I vacuum his path from the bathroom to the door to the windows. I take off my dog hair covered clothes and sequester them in the washing machine for an isolated cycle. I take a long, hot shower.

​When I get out, I see he has done that adorable dog shake move and gotten hair all over the place again. I will be vacuuming one more time.

Four hours have passed. I “saved” sixty whole dollars. Petco, I take back all the things I said. Rigsby will be back for his next grooming.